What Is a Monarchy? by Robert Wilde

What Is a Monarchy?
by Robert Wilde
Updated January 12, 2018
A monarchy is a form of government in which total sovereignty is invested in one person, a head of state called a monarch, who holds the position until death or abdication. Monarchs usually both hold and achieve their position through the right of hereditary succession (e.g. they were related, usually the son or daughter, of the previous monarch), although there have been elective monarchies, where the monarch holds the position after being elected: the papacy is sometimes called an elective monarchy.

There have also been hereditary rulers who weren’t considered monarchs, such as the stadtholders of Holland. Many monarchs have invoked religious reasons, such as being chosen by God, as a justification for their rule. Courts are often considered a key aspect of monarchies. These occur around the monarchs and provide a social meeting place for monarch and nobility.

Titles of a Monarchy
Male monarchs are often called kings, and females queens, but principalities, where princes and princesses rule by hereditary right, are sometimes referred to as monarchies, as are empires led by emperors and empresses.

Levels of Power
The amount of power a monarch wields has varied across time and situation, with a good deal of European national history comprising a power struggle between the monarch and either their nobility and subjects. On the one hand, you have the absolute monarchies of the early modern period, the best example being French King Louis XIV, where the monarch (in theory at least) had total power over everything they wished.

On the other, you have constitutional monarchies where the monarch is now little more than a figurehead and the majority of power rests with other forms of government. There is traditionally only one monarch per monarchy at a time, although in Britain King William and Queen Mary ruled simultaneously between 1689 and 1694.

When a monarch is either considered too young or too ill to take full control of their office or is absent (perhaps on crusade), a regent (or group of regents) rules in their place.

Monarchies in Europe
Monarchies were often born out of unified military leadership, where successful commanders transformed their power into something hereditary. The Germanic tribes of the first few centuries CE are believed to have unified in this way, as peoples grouped together under charismatic and successful war leaders, who solidified their power, possibly at first taking on Roman titles and then emerging as kings.

Monarchies were the dominant form of government among European nations from the end of the Roman era until around the eighteenth century (although some people class the Roman emperors as monarchs). A distinction is often made between the older monarchies of Europe and the ‘New Monarchies’ of the sixteenth centuries and later (rulers such as King Henry VIII of England), where the organisation of standing armies and overseas empires necessitated large bureaucracies for better tax collection and control, enabling projections of power much above those of the old monarchs. Absolutism was at its height in this era.

The Modern Age
After the absolute era, a period of republicanism took place, as secular and enlightenment thinking, including the concepts of individual rights and self-determination, undermined the claims of the monarchs. A new form of “nationalist monarchy” also emerged in the eighteenth century, whereby a single powerful and hereditary monarch ruled on behalf of the people to secure their independence, as opposed to expanding the power and possessions of the monarch themselves (the kingdom belonging to the monarch). In contrast was the development of the constitutional monarchy, where the powers of the monarch were slowly passed down to other, more democratic, bodies of government. More common was the replacement of monarchy by a republican government within the state, such as the French Revolution of 1789 in France.

Remaining Monarchies of Europe
As of this writing, there are only 11 or 12 European monarchies depending on whether you count the Vatican City: seven kingdoms, three principalities, a grand duchy and the elective monarchy of the Vatican.

Kingdoms (Kings/Queens)

Belgium
Denmark
The Netherlands
Norway
Spain
Sweden
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
Principalities (Princes/Princess’)